Thursday, January 23, 2014

White Whale Records Spotlight: The Clique - Superman

In search of the elusive White Whale (records) for another day. You can call us Ishmael!

The Clique hailed from Houston, Texas and emerged out of Houston garage band, The Lavender Hour, perhaps best known for their 1967 song, I've Got A Way With Girls. That number was covered by The Chesterfield Kings sometime around 1986. (We wrote about their version a couple of years ago. Check it out here).

Back to The Clique: Truth be told, I don't have much positive to point towards when it comes to The Clique. They did an okay cover of The 13th Floor Elevators' Splash 1, but their bubblegum sound took over on way too many of their songs other than this one fabulous pop song called Superman. It is of course the Flip-Side to a lesser song pimped out as the A-Side. And it would have stayed largely obscure if not for a band from Georgia called R.E.M. who covered Superman nicely in 1986 for their Life's Rich Pageant album. The harmonies on this song are superb and the simplicity of the structure of the song make this irresistible. I'd argue that the song sounds like a song from earlier in the 60s, but this was released in the Summer of 1969 as the music all around them was getting very heavy and very self indulgent.